Castro's victory complete

Elián González, the boy they had protected for months, was in the clutches of Cuban leader Fidel Castro on Wednesday evening.

Exile leaders swore it would never happen. They vowed to keep Elián from communism. They promised Castro would never be able to use Elián to his advantage.

But as Elián's plane touched down on the Havana tarmac, exiles knew they had lost. The man they so hate, the man they see as a brutal dictator and tormentor, the man they want to overthrow, had scored a major public relations coup.

It was a bitter outcome for exiles and a sweet moment for Castro. And even to the end, exiles prayed for divine intervention.

"Wouldn't it be nice if at the moment Elián steps off the plane in Havana, Fidel Castro drops dead?" asked Grace Reyes, whose family fled Cuba when she was an infant, as Elián's plane flew toward Cuba on Wednesday.

Instead, Castro basked in victory.

In the five decades of his revolution, Castro has dealt some significant blows against his South Florida foes. He thwarted an exile force at the Bay of Pigs in 1962. He sent troops to usher a communist regime to power in Angola in the 1980s. He welcomed the pope to Cuba in 1998. He opened trade avenues with Europe and Canada despite American opposition.

But never before had an issue so galvanized Cubans -- and Americans. Never before had Castro found himself so much on the favorable side of American public opinion and in such agreement with the U.S. leadership and Uncle Sam's judicial system.

Despite exiles' claims, the odds were strongly in favor of the Cuban leader when it came to fighting for Elián's return, analysts say.

Since November, when Elián was rescued at sea after his mother drowned while trying to flee Cuba, Castro has whipped up the emotions of Cubans.

"Castro's telling people all the time that if the revolution fails, the Miami Mafia is going to come and take everything back," said William LeoGrande, a professor at American University in Washington, D.C. "Well, here's (Castro's) proof. They were even willing to take their children Every parent in Cuba can identify with that. It could have happened to any of them."

As hundreds of thousands of Cubans protested in the streets and stirred to Castro's speeches, they found much sympathy among Americans.

The Clinton administration supported reuniting the boy with his father. Outside of Miami, many Americans were furious that the Cuban exiles continued to defy U.S. authorities.

And after federal agents seized Elián from Miami relatives in April, and his American relatives waged a court battle to get him back, anti-exile sentiments only heightened. Surveys showed most Americans favored reuniting Elián with his father.

"The reaction toward the exiles outside of Miami was extremely negative," said Wayne Smith, former chief of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana. "This only helped Castro increase his rhetoric."

Exiles realized long ago they were fighting a losing cause, leaders of Miami's Cuban community said on Wednesday.

"We fought a hard battle," said Carlos Saladrigas, one of the negotiators inside the house when federal agents raided it. "We were trying to raise complex ethical and moral issues that were no match for simple and catchy sound bites about a father's rights."

But, no doubt, Castro in the coming days will tout Elián's return in speeches and rallies.

"It has always been his way to parade these things around as great victories," said Robert Quirk, an Indiana University history professor who wrote a book about Castro's life. "He will try to use this to his advantage for as long as possible."

Eddy Machine, a Communist Party member in Cuba, said Elián's return demonstrated that the Cuban leader and his people "are invincible."

"I think that once more, Fidel's genius has shown through," Machine said. "He led this battle step by step, always making exactly the right move at the right time, and completely defeated the Miami Mafia and their allies."

But in truth, the Castro regime had little to do with Elián's return.

"It was a victory produced by the legal system in the United States," Smith said.

And in the long run, the momentum of Elián's return will fade as Cubans return to their dreary lives, veteran Cuba watchers say.

"Will it put more food on the table?" asked Jamie Suchlicki, a University of Miami analyst who has spent months trying to cast exiles in a positive light in the American media.

"In many ways this is a lesser victory for him than, say, what happened in Angola because he will not be able to use it for long and it will not result in improvements for Cubans," he said.

Still, exiles were seething Wednesday night. They see Elián's return less as a Castro victory and more as a betrayal by the Clinton administration, which has favored liberalizing U.S. ties with Cuba.

"Of course, (Castro) is going to celebrate," said Bienvenido Comas, 24, of Miami. "The boy is a trophy."

Sun-Sentinel Staff Writers Rafael Lorente and Margarita Martin-Hidalgo contributed to this report.
E.A. Torriero can be reached at etorriero@sun-sentinel.com or 954-356-4578.